Turn to Luke 15. Luke chapter 15, and to give honor to God and his holy word, we'll stand as we read this God's holy and infallible word. Luke 15, starting at verse one. Now all the tax collectors and the sinners were coming near him to listen to him. Both the Pharisees and the scribes began to grumble, saying, This man receives sinners and eats with them. So he told them this parable, saying, What man among you, if he has a hundred sheep and has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open pasture and go after the one which is lost until he finds it? When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep, which was lost. I tell you that in the same way there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who need no repentance. Or what woman, if she has 10 silver coins and loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors saying, rejoice with me, for I have found the coin which I had lost. In the same way, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. Let's pray together. Our glorious Lord, thank you for this, your word. and help us to rejoice in what you rejoice in, especially in faith and repentance of those who believe, and help us to rejoice in our faith that you have given to us through your word and Holy Spirit, and through that new birth of regeneration. Help us, we pray, to rejoice as we study and as we hear the preaching of this, your word, for we ask it in Jesus' name, amen. Please be seated. What is it that brings you joy? Because people are very different, personalities are rather different, as many different personalities as there are, there are probably that many different things or hobbies or interests that bring us joy. One thing that might make you very excited, the person next to you might walk by and look at it and shrug their shoulders and say, eh, I don't really see much about it. For instance, some people have hobbies in fishing, some hunting, some sports, some movies, television, social media. Some people still love social media. That's kind of seem like it might be waning some. Music, arts, literature, reading all sorts of fiction maybe, or maybe some people like to read history. Maybe some love to read theology. Some love cooking. Some love eating. Most of us like eating. Some people like gardens, crafts, nature, all sorts of things. I personally, as I've gotten older, have learned to love nature more and more as I've gotten older because I love what God has made. I love His creation, therefore, because He loves it, I love it, and I just think that if He delights in the beauty of this creation, we should delight in it as well. One thing we learn in today's text is that among the many things that God delights in, one thing we find is that He delights in those who repent of their sin. Now, earlier in this gospel account, there were great multitudes who were following Jesus. One time it mentions, beginning of chapter 12, many thousands following Him. Some, perhaps, wanted another meal of fish and bread. Some followed Him because they wanted to be healed of a lingering disease. Others followed Him because they wanted, perhaps, to have a loved one cured or freed from an evil spirit. Others followed Him because they wanted Jesus to be their next Messiah, or the true long-awaited Messiah, but they wanted Him to be the next king and ruler who would free them from Roman oppression. And then when Jesus didn't fit the bill for that, some of them departed. Jesus did warn them in our previous sermon. He warned them to count the costs because so many were following him for the wrong reasons. He wanted them to count the costs of being a disciple. Being a disciple of Jesus, he said, could cause them their family. It could cause them to lose all of their possessions, or most of their possessions, if they were suffering persecution. Or it could cause them to lose their own life. And the beginning of church history tells us that many in the first century lost their life and were persecuted unto death for the sake of the gospel. Today's text, the main focus is that heaven has joy in your faith and repentance. Heaven has joy in your faith and repentance. And we'll look at this in three main points. Jesus receives sinners who repent. And secondly, the seeking love of God. And thirdly, heaven's joy in your repentance. So let's look at this first main point. Jesus receives sinners who repent. Verses one and two. Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near him to listen to him. Both the Pharisees and the scribes began to grumble, saying, This man receives sinners and eats with them. I do believe to help understand this a little bit better, verses 1 and 2, it might help us to put the word notorious before sinners because I think that's the spirit of what is being talked about here. The word sinners was used here in a labeling sense of those who were basically wicked to the point that they were outside of the synagogue and they were not in good standing with the synagogue because they were having lives that were dominated by sin. Earlier in chapter seven, Jesus was invited to the house of the Pharisee. While he's in the house of the Pharisee, a woman comes in and she anoints the feet of Jesus with perfume, very expensive perfume in an alabaster flask. And then as she anoints his feet, her tears are raining down upon his feet, and then she wipes his feet with her hair. But the Pharisee says, If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what sort of person this woman is, who is touching him, that she is a sinner, not just a sinner, a notorious sinner, and likely a harlot. That's found in Luke 7, verse 30 something and following, but verse 39 is that quote. Now, according to John chapter 11, according to John chapter 11, one and following, This woman was the sister of Martha and Lazarus of Bethany. We know from the gospel accounts that she continued to follow Jesus. She wasn't in a brothel or doing anything immoral. She continued to follow Jesus. She sat at the feet of Jesus and she departed from that way of life. Other notorious sinners included tax collectors, because they were those who were very commonly those who stole from those who they were collecting taxes from. They didn't just take what was owed to the Roman government, they took for themselves and defrauded others. One such notorious tax collector was a man named Levi, who is also called Matthew, according to Luke 5, 27 and following. This tax collector, Matthew or Levi, was called from his tax booth and Jesus said to him, follow me. And he left and followed him. He left that practice and then he continued following Jesus and even wrote a very magnificent gospel account, the gospel according to Matthew. But shortly after Matthew was converted, he was so zealous and so excited over his faith that he threw a great reception and invited his other tax collector friends and other sinners to this reception because he wanted them to hear Jesus, to hear his preaching and teaching. But what did they say? What did the Pharisees say when they saw that Jesus was at a gathering at a tax collector's home with other tax collectors and people who they labeled as sinners? They said in Luke 5, the Pharisees and their scribes began grumbling at his disciples saying, why do you eat and drink with the tax collectors and sinners? And Jesus answered, I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. That's why he was spending time with them. We'll look a little bit more of what that means, what that means. We'll look a little bit more of that later. Now these Pharisees, had a very wrong notion that they could be right in God's sight, that they could be righteous in God's sight by their keeping of the ceremonial and moral law, and it was a flawed thinking. They condemned others, especially those without theological education, who did not follow in their ways. They said of those who were in the crowds following Jesus that they did not know the law and they were cursed because they followed this Lord Jesus. Now, the people who were following the Lord Jesus probably looked at prophecies concerning who the Messiah was and believed those prophecies more than they did. But it shouldn't surprise us that these Pharisees here in our text are again grumbling because Jesus is with sinners. How could he be the Messiah if he's going to have fellowship with sinners? Perhaps he's condoning the sin of sinners, they might say, by eating with them. We'll find out that he didn't. Let's look at this next main point, the seeking love of God. This is why Jesus sat and ate with sinners, notorious sinners, verses three through five. So he told them, these Pharisees, this parable, saying, what man among you, if he has a hundred sheep and has lost one of them, does not leave the 99 in the open pasture and go after the one which is lost until he finds it? When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. I honestly believe these Pharisees were not the type of men who would go out looking for lost sheep. Ezekiel 34 rebuked the shepherds of Israel because they didn't feed the sheep, they fed themselves. And even they preyed upon the sheep, they hit them with their horns and butted them and were mean and evil to the sheep of Israel. And these men followed the same sort of practice. In that wonderful passage in Ezekiel 34, long after David had died, God promised this, I will set over them, over my people Israel, one shepherd, my servant David, and he will feed them. He will feed them himself and be their shepherd. That's why Jesus calls himself the Good Shepherd. That's why Jesus is also called the Son of David. It wasn't David who was going to come back being reincarnated. It was the Son of David who was going to be the Good Shepherd. And that Son of David, when you hear that in the Bible, that's a title, a messianic title for Jesus Messiah. So in this parable, getting back to this parable, Jesus is appealing to their office or their role as teacher that they should have been compelled to be the kind of men who would leave the 99 and go after the long lost sheep. He was talking to them as though how they should have been. That's when he said, I believe here is a rhetorical question, what man among you does not leave the 99 and go after the one lost sheep until he finds it? Now a shepherd might be motivated to do this and say, you know what, I think strategically it's better to stick to 99 sheep. and not worry about that one lost sheep because maybe if I leave the 99, I might lose some more. So why don't I just let this one lost sheep remain lost and just cut my losses? After all, this sheep is kind of dumb and he got himself into this trouble and wandered off. Why not just let him come back if he can? And if he can't come back, so be it. I've lost that one sheep. I still have the 99. But that's not the way God is. This parable is teaching us about the character of God. God is concerned about the lost sheep and he goes out and searches after them. Our Lord is a loving and merciful God in the way he treats his sheep. He is compassionate even to those who fall into sin and goes and searches out for those who sin and wander off from the fold. And maybe someone here in this message has wandered off and fallen into sin, but God promises that if you seek him, he will rescue you. Jesus says, come unto me, you who are weary. weary of sin, and I will give you rest. I will give you rest for your souls, Jesus says in Matthew 11, 28. Jesus promises to reconcile you to the Father through his perfect blood, that he died, that you would be forgiven, and that he lived a perfect and holy life, that if you put your faith in him, you will be accounted and reckoned as righteous in God's sight because of the righteousness of Christ, given to you by faith. Jesus used another parable to show God's seeking love for lost sinners. Look at verse eight. Or what woman, if she has ten silver coins and loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? Think about the effort of this. Maybe it's not just sweeping. Maybe you've got to clean up the house first. You've got to pick up all the stuff off the floor before you can sweep. And then you've got to do this effort of then sweeping the house. That's a lot of effort just for this one lost coin. I mean, I don't know about you, would you clean your entire house for one coin? Most of us probably would just say, I got more money, I don't care. But this parable is to illustrate the care and the love and even God's faithfulness and diligence in searching after the long lost coin or sheep or lost child. Pharisees, I believe, didn't really care to lift much of a finger to look for the lost. And if they ever did find those who they could convert into their way, they brought them in to become as much of a son of the devil as they were. But the beauty of God seeking love is not only that God seeks out the lost, but God delights in those who come unto him with repentance. That leads us to our third point, heaven's joy in your repentance. Speaking of the shepherd who finds this lost sheep, look at verses five through seven. When he has found it, He lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors saying to them, rejoice with me for I have found my sheep, which was lost. I tell you in the same way that there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who need no repentance. You might say a shepherd who's searching hard and long and going through the trouble of finding the sheep, maybe once he finds it he would be a little bit upset with this particular sheep. He might want to kick it along the way as he brings it back to the fold. You dumb sheep, why did you wander off? What kind of trouble did you cause me? Don't you dare do this again. It's highly doubtful that a shepherd would rejoice in the way that's mentioned in this particular parable, but this shows us the heart of God's love for lost sinners. He doesn't have this sort of earthly attitude that you might expect. He rejoices and even throws a party, a banquet, a reception for his lost sheep. He invites his friends and neighbors and he says, come rejoice with me for I found my lost sheep. Again, this parable represents for us the love of Jesus, the good shepherd. who together calls his angels to join him in rejoicing over those who have been brought to faith and repentance through his gospel. Our trying God rejoices over lost sheep who come back into the fold, lost sinners who repent of their sin. Now this word here, repentance, In the Greek, it means to change one's way of life as a result of a complete change of thought and attitude with regard to sin and righteousness. That's a long definition, but I think it's a very good, thorough definition. In modern evangelicalism, what's asked of people is that they might walk the aisle. that they might pray the sinner's prayer, or I've actually been to a funeral recently where the preacher said, everyone close your eyes and if you want to accept the Lord Jesus, raise your hand. Now, it's good for people to make a profession of faith. It's good to confess Christ as Lord and Savior. It's good to pray the sinner's prayer. It's good to say that Jesus is your Lord and Savior. But the focus of this text is repentance. Not only confessing Christ as Lord and Savior, but having this turning away from sin and turning unto God with an endeavor after new obedience. In other words, God doesn't want just your confession of faith. He wants you to have a changed life as well. For those who call upon Him and say, Lord, Lord, but have their lives that are just like the rest of the world and live like the devil, on that day of judgment, He will say, I do not know. You depart from Me. You who practice lawlessness. Now, again, repentance, the focus of today's text, are those who are outside of the kingdom, who are outside of the household of faith, who are separate from the flock, and who come back in. But at the same time, I believe here that this text does not exclude the fact that even if a Christian has been many years in church and many years devoted to the Lord, yet turns from sin and gets victory over particular sins. At the same time, I think it's still a cause for God's rejoicing in heaven. In other words, you might be a Christian 30, 40 years, but if God helps you overcome a particular besetting sin, heaven rejoices in that. I believe we can apply that from today's text. One misinterpretation of verse seven is this, is that the Pharisees and scribes were the righteous who didn't really need repentance. They were the righteous ones. In order to understand this text, you have to let scripture interpret scripture. Matthew 23, Jesus pronounces a great many woes of rebuke against the sins of the Pharisees. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees. And he lists a number of terrible, condemning sins. So I believe here that's evidence to say that they were still in desperate need of true repentance. The Lord Jesus uses this language in verse seven to refer to how the Pharisees saw themselves. They didn't see themselves as sinners. They saw themselves as righteous in God's sight because they were teachers of the law and they believed doers of the law. But it was much of it was all for show. Jesus said they were like a cup, a beautiful white cup that's all washed and pretty on the outside, yet inside it's full of filth. Imagine somebody invites you to their house and they give you a nice pretty white cup, yet you look on the inside and it's full of like moldy cake batter that's hardened up and dehydrated. And you go to take a drink and you're like, whoa, watch out. That's kind of what they were presenting before God, an old cup, pretty on the outside but full of moldy funk on the inside. And getting back to this parable of the lost coin, this woman also represents heaven's joy when one sinner repents. Look at verses nine through 10. When she found it, that is when she found the lost coin, she calls together her friends and neighbors and saying, rejoice with me for I have found the coin which I had lost. In the same way I tell you there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. Brothers and sisters, because God and the holy angels rejoice over one sinner who repents, we should rejoice when sinners repent of their sin. That should give us great joy as well. The Pharisees could not rejoice in this because they were jealous of Jesus, they hated Jesus, and they were blind by unbelief. It is a good thing to delight in the wonderful things of this world. Try to find something that brings you joy. Try to find something that God delights in. There are so many things that God delights in. You don't have to pick something that God is upset or offended at. Try to find those things in life that God is pleased with. But the one thing, the focus of today's text is that God is delighting in the repentance, the faith and repentance of sinners. When a sinner repents, God rejoices along with the holy angels in heaven. Jesus receives sinners who repent, not just those who make a profession of faith, but those who turn away from their sin or at least have an endeavor to have a demonstration of a true and lively faith. Tax collectors, prostitutes, and even other notorious sinners came unto Jesus and turned away from their sin in following Him. Remember the seeking love of God. Our God loves sinners so much is that He searches out carefully for us. If we are His, He searches for us because He loves us. If you fall into sin and stray away from the path that God has set for the people of God, He will still find you out. Listen for His voice. Listen for His voice because those who are His sheep, they will hear the voice of the shepherd and they will follow Him because they know Him. Heaven rejoices when you come to Him with faith and repentance. It should be our heart's desire to please God first and foremost, to bring joy to heaven, not only for the new converts, but even for our repentance as well. Let's pray together. Father, we thank you that you are the God who has a searching love for lost sinners, and we thank you that you have searched us out, and that you have brought us to yourself, and you have opened our hearts and our minds to believe these things written in your holy gospel. And we pray that you would help us to have faith and to truly repent of our sin. Help us to bring forth joy in heaven, as we turn from our ways, our sinful ways, and as we turn with faith and repentance unto our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, who has died for sinners such as us. Work in us, saving faith, and help us have a life that demonstrates a lively faith rather than a dead faith. For we ask all these things in the name of Jesus, our Lord. Amen. For our closing hymn, our hymn of dedication, let's turn to 486. 486, rejoice believer in the Lord. Let's stand and sing 46.